Constructing Good Bangs

[James_Nostack]

While most of the people who post at the Forge are regulars, I expect a lot of the lurkers are newcomers who don't understand all this Bang and Kicker stuff.  I know I'm still struggling with writing Bangs.

So: practically speaking: how does a GM come up with some good bangs?  

And: what are some great bangs you've used?  What made them great?  

And: what were some lousy bangs you've used?  What made them lousy?


I'm sorry if this isn't theoretical enough for this folder, but it seems to me that some practical advice on these theoretical topics might be helpful to the end user.

[James_Nostack]

To reply to my own thread, I'd say that a good bang ought to be...

* Insistent.  You've got a real problem, one that will only get worse if you ignore it.

* Thematic.  "Theme" has a couple different meanings on the Forge, but I'm using it in a general sense: a good Bang ought to tie into what the game is about, either in terms of setting, or a player-character's "inner conflict," or whatever.

* Open-Ended.  A good Bang ought to invite a legitimate choice on the players' part.  "A crazed goblin attacks you: do you choose to defend yourself?" isn't much of a choice.

Am I missing anything?

[Judd]

They are also geared to the player.

If you know Player X likes to be a bad-ass, put him in situations where he can make bad-ass decisions.  If you know Player Y likes getting in way over her heard and coming out the other side, put her in the deep end and watch her swim.

You can get a feel for what the player wants during the character creation process.

Also, you can sometimes feel a player immediatelly bond with an NPC, you know you can make some quality bangs from their interactions or alter a bang to include that energy.

[James_Nostack]

And an example bang from my own campaign:

The heroes have decided to spring a friend from a futuristic insane asylum, but ran afoul of security personnel, and have gotten themselves trapped in a corridor.  Slowly it's filling up with knock-out gas.  

The Chief Brainwasher shows up and tries to persuade them to give up their friend (a fellow PC, one with uncontrollable murderous impulses, who has been on a 10 year quest to find the man who exterminated his family).  

One of the heroes, a very idealistic goody-two-shoes who always does what's right, issues a defiant refusal.  "I'll defend my friend to the death!"

At which point the Chief Brainwasher announces that this idealist was, in fact, one of the Brainwasher's allies and exterminated the friend's family.  The idealist doesn't remember this due to brainwashing.  (I had already discussed the idealist having serious memory issues with the player beforehand.)

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So, it's urgent.  Knock-out gas, security personnel, friend at risk.

It's thematic.  Tties into one player's quest for vengeance: what happens when it turns out to be your best friend?, and another player's quest for high ideals: what happens when you've done something horrible?

It's open-ended.  Naturally the two players have some real sketchy issues to work out any way they choose--assuming they can even trust the information.  Also, they can try to talk their way out of trouble.  Or they can disable the gas and find a way out.

Given the complicated set-up (which wasn't forced but happened pretty naturally), was this a "Bang"?

[TonyLB]

What Judd said.  The more I play Bang-empowering games, the more I realize:  You cannot aim them at the character.  You can only use the character as a signpost to help figure out what the player wants.

If a game has a fair playing field for you and your prospective victim to vie for control of narration then I would say that the easiest Bang formula is this:  Figure out something the player really, really doesn't want as part of the story, then threaten to narrate exactly that if they don't stop you.  Make them know that if you aren't stopped you will violate their comfort zone.

In our Capes game, Sydney plays a creepy little girl who has shown psychotic-level detachment from everyone and everything.  "Oh I do hope they aren't all dead," she says of her friends, "it would make such a mess on the carpet."

So I created "Goal:  Make Minerva fall in love", and dropped it right in front of him.  He gave the response that lets me know I've done my job right:  "Oh, that's just a horrible and disturbing concept."  And he then proceeded to do some wonderful roleplaying dealing with the entirely abstract notion that her emotional invulnerability was being assaulted.

Looking at just the story and the character, he could have let it go.  It's not as if the police are breaking down the door ready to shoot his goth-chick.  It's not like goth-chick is allergic to love.  But he can't let it go, because of the player he is and the way he wants to portray the character.  It forces him to step up and take responsibility for actively establishing the message of his own character, rather than hoping that it will somehow happen on its own.


EDIT:  I think that last sentence is my new answer to why adversity is important in a game where people are cooperating to tell a story.

[Bill Cook]

Given the complicated set-up (which wasn't forced but happened pretty naturally), was this a "Bang"?

I think you're mistaking a plot twist for a Bang. They don't necessarily entail revelation or layers of complexity. The security guards alone could be the Bang. The gas is an escalation of threat. I think the ally-as-enemy disclosure on top of that is confusing.

An event is thematic (and therefore Bang-y) for as much as it leads to player investment. Assuming you know which material to target, advice upthread rings true: provide opportunities to be their character's coolness; place obstacles in their path.

You could describe lots of situational dilemmas, but whether they're Bangs is in the mind of the player. So a useful inquiry as preparation to Bang would be "what's your fun?"

I recently GM'd a game with a PC drinking in a bar. His whole deal was that he'd just discovered a vein of gold in an abandoned mine shaft. The evidence was a nugget in his pocket. So I took control of the character and said he called for songs, jokes and drink to celebrate. Then, in the midst of his revelry, he thoughlessly tossed the very nugget, as payment, onto an open table in a full hall, inciting envy and curiosity. Was that a Bang? Did it demand action? Was it thematically relevant? I don't know. I hope it made for more interesting play.

Last year, in a TROS game, my Seneschal said I heard a knock at the door. I opened and found only a basket. It held blood-stained sheets in a wrap, with flies buzzing around. I pulled back the folds to reveal the severed head of my nemesis! Well, that certainly was unexpected. And it lead to a big spike in play for the whole group. But initially, it just pissed me off because I couldn't take revenge on a corpse. Was that a Bang? I'm not sure.

[Callan S.]

On a related side topic: From recent posts I've begun to think that bangs are also very useful for gamist play as well. Anyone have any thoughts on that?

[Judd]

Last year, in a TROS game, my Seneschal said I heard a knock at the door. I opened and found only a basket. It held blood-stained sheets in a wrap, with flies buzzing around. I pulled back the folds to reveal the severed head of my nemesis! Well, that certainly was unexpected. And it lead to a big spike in play for the whole group. But initially, it just pissed me off because I couldn't take revenge on a corpse. Was that a Bang? I'm not sure.

Absolutely that was a bang.

It was a situation that led you to react...BANG!

[Alan]

I've found something from a fiction writing source that I think has something to apply to bangs: the "Dramatic Event."

Each scene contains a Dramatic Event:

This Event:

- is irreversible
- changes the character's circumstances (the character can no longer continue doing what he was doing)
- gives new and more important purposes
- is meaningful to the characters

We might use this as a standard for a really great Bang:

The Ideal Bang
- creates a situation that presents a choice of actions to the character
- the choice addresses a premise meaningful to the player
- the choice gives new and more important purposes to the character
- after a bang, the character can no longer continue doing what he was doing.

(Note: I used "player" and "character" deliberately.)

I think 1 and 2 are essential to a Bang.  3 and 4 happen when play is  really right on target.

[Ron Edwards]

Hello,

These two recent threads in the Adept Press forum might be helpful: [Sorc] Toon Town Confidential - final session Bangs and [Actual play] Sorcerer: the tenure game (game prep).

Best,
Ron

[FzGhouL]

I'd say another requirement is it must be risky or challanging, either in dificulty, or it must be a challange like "hey, now I have to think!"

I think one way to make a nice bang is to split the campaign up into groups of characters. 1-3 players a group. Players will flow between groups as intentions change etc.

Then, when they conflict, you have a nice double bang.
Your interest and his interest aren't the same.
If you don't change him, you won't get your goals fufilled.
Attempting a diplomatic or physical force to change another player is challanging.

Something that happens frequently when I lead a game is the players meet at a town after-and-before some pivotal events. Some tangible reason they all may be there, without having called for each other.
My players like to allows have a superior strategy to the other characters. After time off from each other, they will ALWAYS want to revaluate the other characters skills. Their goals for an end result will more or less be aligned, but in this transition between plot turning events, a clash happens between characters.

This is nice for the plot because one clash ALWAYS leads to another between PCs. Start the Bangs early and you'll have em' made constantly.

[Alan]

I think there's some confusion going on here.  Bangs are solely an element of addressing premise (ie related to narrativist Creative Agenda).  As such, challenge is not part of a Bang.  Gamist play has its equivalent to a bang, which I believe, Ron simply calls Challenge or Step on Up.  

I know everyone wants to coopt the cool term Bang for other Creative Agendas, but if you check Ron's Glossary, you'll find there's no need to.  I think it's much more useful to retain the distinctions - especially if we're going to talk about what makes a good Bang.  If we start confusing an element of narrativist play with one of Gamist or Simulationist play, there will be no way to establish clear guidelines for "good."

[James_Nostack]

Alan, I appreciate your point, but if taken to heart I would need to rephrase my initial post.  While I think GNS is a nice theory, in practical application you might end up with everyone at the gaming table with different agendas and an "incoherent" rule system.  I'd prefer not to split hairs in that way, since my initial request was for practical advice.

So, let me rephrase the initial post: what are good ways to develop a "ka-pow" (because it's not a bang) that is...

1.  Insistent
2.  Open-ended
3.  Meaningful, either for...
        a. the Players, which would be a Narrativist concern?
        b. the imaginary characters, which would be Gamist?
        c. the imaginary setting, which would be Simulationist?

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In the example category:

I've got this player who's running a diplomat character in a campaign devoted to future shock and weird moral systems.  As a diplomat this character is exceedingly non-judgmental, and slips into exotic modes of thought quite easily to see the other side's point of view.  Our group hasn't discussed "creative agendas" explicitly, but based on their reactions they've enjoyed the Narrativist elements I've thrown in from time to time, so I would like to give a Bang to this player.

There may be some good conflict to be had by seeing how far you can push Cultural Relativism.  Does this guy believe in anything?  If so, what?  Or, how did he get to be so supple and rootless?  Were there consequences when he adopted this (meta-)belief system?  If so, what happens when some of those consequences come back to haunt him?  

All of which is too vague to be actionable, at least at this stage.  If people have advice, I'd like to hear it.

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In the event, however, I tried to figure out how far the player wanted to extend the character's "it's all relative" philosophy.  The character has an old enemy who is up to no good and has kidnapped a friend to blackmail the character into assisting him.  ("I'll let her go if you help me design my Orbital Death Ray against these people you've never heard of.")  

So the player has to make a thematic decision about whether a concrete thing like Friendship is worth more than some abstraction like the Lives of Strangers.

So, there's something insistent (the imperiled friend), open-ended (risk the friend? risk the strangers? find a clever solution?), and thematically meaningful.  

(In Actual Play we haven't resolved this yet, but the character is rationalizing just leaving town.  "We aren't really close friends; she's got some useful information but we've since acquired it by other means...")

[James_Nostack]

It has been brought to my attention that the initial post used terminology specifically related to a narrativist mode of play, so the prior post is non-sensical in terms of GNS.

(I do not see why Bangs must necessarily be narrativist, since it looks to me like there's something similar going on in any exciting play session regardless of the overall agenda.  But that's a tangential topic best saved for another thread.)

So - let's forget I said that stuff about other modes of play, since it's not immediately relevant to a strictly narrativist view of bangs.  

Assuming one is interested in narrativist bangs: how do you go about brainstorming them?  Do you discuss them with the player beforehand, or save them as a surprise?  What indicates that you might have a good idea for a bang?

[Ron Edwards]

Hi James,

The threads I linked to point out the basic technique that's specific to Sorcerer - using the diagrams on the backs of the character sheets. It's easy and fun, and reduces the widely-perceived necessary prep time for Sorcerer by a considerable, even exponential amount.

However, it's also specific to Sorcerer. To find equivalents using other systems means understanding the point of the process, so that puts you in a bit of a circle: to get the point by examining the systems, understanding the systems by already understanding the point. You aren't going to get anywhere with that.

So I do recommend restricting your focus to Sorcerer, if possible - reading the threads I linked to and the internal links within them, and most especially tying those issues into the basic reward system of the game. I'm hesitant to argue from the standpoint of saying "buy my book," but Sorcerer & Sword really is nothing but 112 pages devoted to the proper construction and disposal of Bangs.

If the whole concept of a Bang then works better for you, then you should be able to see how it's achieved - but completely structurally different - in games like HeroQuest, Legend of Alyria, and The Riddle of Steel to some extent. You should also be able to see how games like The Mountain Witch, My Life with Master, and (tacitly) The Pool are really nothing but BANG with role-playing as merely a methodological tool to get BANG'd in.

You raise the point that all role-playing relies on "moments" of engagement for the participants. This is correct and I've never said differently; the Glossary is very clear about that. However, the content of these moments is so different according to (and defined by) differing Creative Agendas that they really demand different terms.

Best,
Ron